She stood in the centre of the room, breathing deeply to steady her nerves. She looked at the note again: very Cindy. But that was all finished with now, in the past. She shifted her gaze to her future, hanging in front of her in the form of a large Andrew Wyeth canvas on the wall . . .
Jose heard a single cry and looked at his wife. He was about to go into the bedroom when the door opened. Kendall almost pushed him out of her way as she hurried towards the master suite, stopping halfway along the passage to stare at another painting. She was breathing hard, and cried out again before she pushed open the doors to the master suite.
‘Go downstairs both of you, just go downstairs.’ She slammed the door after her.
Jose looked at his wife in confusion. ‘Do as she says, Jose.’
‘But shouldn’t we call someone? She’s dead in there,’ he said, pointing to Cindy’s bedroom. Suddenly there was a crash, and they heard a scream, as Kendall hurtled out of her ex-husband’s bedroom, her face flushed and her eyes wild.
‘Who else has been in this house? You’d better tell me, Jose. I want to know who has been in this fucking house, do you hear me?’
Jose was halfway down the stairs, but looked up to see Kendall leaning over the banisters.
‘Who has been here? Tell me.’
Juana answered from the bottom of the staircase. ‘No one, Mrs Nathan. I swear to you, no one but the police and Cindy.’
‘Has Feinstein been here? Any of his people?’ Kendall sprang down the stairs to stand, trembling with fury, in front of Jose and gave the man a sudden shove. ‘I want to know – tell me who has been here!’
Jose lost his footing, stumbled and clung to the rail. ‘No one, Mrs Nathan, I swear to you.’
Kendall held her head between her hands, repeating, ‘Oh, my God, oh, my God, no . . . No!’
Juana and Jose watched as Kendall ran from room to room like a woman possessed, screaming and shouting incoherently. She smashed ornaments, knocked a piece of sculpture to the ground, dragged two canvases from the walls. The couple were so scared they ran to the kitchen and shut the door. They stood listening to Kendall’s shouts and screams, and the thumps and crashes as she continued moving through the house. Then there was silence, but at least ten minutes passed before she walked in.
‘Call the police – call whoever you want, but you’d better call somebody and tell them about Cindy.’ Kendall made towards the back door.
‘Aren’t you staying, Mrs Nathan?’
Kendall opened the back door without even turning around. ‘No, I hope she rots in hell.’
The door slammed shut after her, and they heard the jeep rev up outside and roar into the road. Jose crossed to the telephone, and Juana looked at him, all distress gone from her face and her features set.
‘Who’s going to pay us what we’re due now?’
CHAPTER 7
LORRAINE KNEW something was up as soon as she saw Decker’s face.
‘Cindy Nathan died last night.’
‘How?’ she asked, without emotion.
‘Found hanged in the shower. Looks like suicide – she left a note and, according to the guy at the house, the police aren’t treating it as murder, for the present at least.’
‘Jose called here?’
‘Yeah, about half an hour ago – phone was ringing as I walked in.’
‘What else did he say?’
Decker ran a hand through his hair. ‘Odd, really – I don’t think he knew why he’d called here. Said his wife suggested it. They both want to talk to you. I said you’d call when you got in.’
Lorraine pursed her lips. ‘I think I’ll do one better – I’ll go and see them. But first get me Jim Sharkey on the phone, would you?’ She changed her mind. ‘No. Ask if Lieutenant Burton will speak to me.’
As she closed her door, Decker knew immediately, from her lack of reaction to Cindy’s death, that something was troubling her. Her mood was abnormally flat, and she had deep circles beneath her eyes.
Lorraine was thinking rapidly. Why had Cindy committed suicide, if, in fact, she had? The girl hadn’t shown any signs of considering suicide, even just after her arrest when she had been under most strain, but perhaps alone, day after day at the house, the prospect of the trial had overwhelmed her. If she had killed her husband, maybe suicide had seemed like the easy way out or, at least, preferable to prison. But what about Kendall Nathan: Could she be involved in some illegal activity to do with the art market, and had killed Cindy, or had her killed, because she had found out? That seemed too far-fetched to be true, but there were the art works, which Kendall had so insistently declared were hers. Could Kendall have imagined that she would stand a better chance of claiming them, if Cindy was dead? She must have known that she would not inherit anything in Cindy’s place, and the collection would now most likely be shipped off to Milwaukee – Lorraine could not stifle a smile at the prospect of millions of dollars’ worth of modern art hanging on the walls at Cindy’s parents’ five and dime. Unless she had left it to someone else? Lorraine wrote herself an immediate memo to do three things: find out the exact terms of Harry Nathan’s will, if Cindy had made any provision in respect of her property, and to check out where Kendall Nathan had been when Cindy Nathan died.
Decker walked in, put some fresh coffee and bagels down on her desk, then tilted his head to one side. ‘You seem kind of low.’
‘Well, maybe I am. Let’s face it, we just lost a big client.’
‘That’s all, is it?’
She snapped, ‘Yes, that’s all, and stop looking at me like I got two heads. Some days you don’t feel so bright, and this just happened to be one of them. You call Lieutenant Burton?’
He told her that Burton’s line was busy, and he would call back. ‘Anything else you want me to do?’
She tried to think straight. ‘What about Sonja Nathan?’ She made another mental note to find out what Sonja got out of the estate.
‘I cancelled the flight - since we don’t have a client, there’s no point in wasting either her time or your money going out there. You want me to do anything else?’
‘Not right now. Oh, yeah, pack the tapes up and send them to Lieutenant Burton. The PD wants them.’
‘They’re welcome to them, I’ll do it straight away. Did you walk Tiger? ‘
‘YES. NOW get out and leave me alone.’
Lorraine sipped the coffee: Decker could really get on her nerves. The intercom light blinked.
‘Lieutenant Burton, line two,’ Decker said briskly, and Lorraine picked up the phone.
‘Mrs Page?’ Burton enquired.
‘Yes, speaking.’ She assumed her most businesslike tones. ‘I’ve asked for the Nathan tapes to be sent over to you, though I understand that may be unnecessary now.’
‘Word travels fast,’ he said softly.
‘She was my client,’ Lorraine said icily.
‘So what can I do for you?’
‘Excuse me?’
‘I’m returning your call, Mrs Page.’
‘Oh, I just wondered if you could tell me any details. I understand there are no suspicious circumstances - is that so?’
He paused a second before answering. ‘It looks that way, but until I’ve read all the reports I can’t say.’
‘Have they done the autopsy?’
‘Presumably.’
‘Not giving away much, are you?’
‘As I said, Mrs Page, until I have seen the reports, I can’t discuss the incident.’
‘You mind if I call you again in a couple of days?’
‘I should have all the facts by then.’
Lorraine felt ill at ease. It was as if they had never met: he seemed cool and offhand. ‘Well, thank you for returning my call,’ she said lamely.
‘Not at all. Goodbye.’ He replaced the receiver immediately, leaving her listening to a dull buzz.
‘Prick,’ she muttered, and pressed the intercom. ‘Can I have some fresh coffee?’
‘By all
means.’ Two minutes later Decker walked in with the coffee pot.
He topped up her cup and she gave his sleeve a tug. ‘Bad morning, sorry.’
He perched on the desk. ‘You want to talk about it?’
‘Not really. It’s just some days, or nights, there doesn’t seem much point. You know, I keep seeing that long tunnel and the future looks kind of dark, and . . .’ He swirled the coffee pot, waiting for her to go on. ‘Well, I sometimes wonder what the hell I’m going to do with my life - or the rest of it. I was fine when I was planning the office and the apartment, and I’ve got this place up and rolling. We may not be exactly snowed under with work, but I’ve got more money in the bank than I ever had . . .’ She sipped the coffee, and looked through the open door at Tiger stretched out comatose on the sofa. ‘And I got my boy out there. I mean, I’ve got a lot to be grateful for.’
‘But you’re not happy?’
She had to turn away from him because she wanted to cry. ‘I should be, I know that.’
Decker knew intuitively not to say anything. She was slowly, and for the first time, opening up to him, and he valued that, because he liked her, and seeing this vulnerable side of her made him like her even more.
‘I’m not complaining,’ she said, fishing in her pocket for a cigarette. Decker still said nothing as she found her lighter, lit up, and inhaled deeply. She repeated, so softly he could scarcely hear her, ‘I’m not complaining.’ Then she swallowed and tried a small smile. ‘Gonna give these up.’ She was looking at the filter tip, the smile hard to hold.
‘That’ll be good - well, better for your health, and mine,’ he said, passing her the ashtray.
‘Yeah, well, who cares about my health?’
‘I do,’ he said, easing off the desk.
‘Thank you. But apart from you, you think anyone will ever care about me? I’m so lonely, Deck, and sometimes I guess I’m frightened that this is all there’s ever going to be for me.’
‘Everyone needs to be loved,’ he said quietly.
She nodded, still looking away. ‘They sure do, and I had so much love, Deck, and I threw it all away. It’s just that, having known it, I want some more but sometimes I don’t think I have the right. You know what I mean?’
He put down the coffee pot, and moved round the desk. ‘Come here.’
She shifted, not wanting him close, but he lifted her from the chair to stand in front of him, then wrapped her in his arms. She resisted, straining away from him, but he held her tightly until she relaxed. He stroked her hair, soothing her, then patted her back as a mother would her child.
The phone rang - Jose calling from the Nathans’ house - and this time Lorraine took the call. She agreed to come and see him straight away. She kissed the top of Decker’s head as she left, and he could see that her mood was 100 per cent better than when she had arrived.
Lorraine drove up the gravel drive to see that curtains had been drawn behind the garden doors and the sliding timber screens on the upper floor were closed.
She had to wait a few moments before Juana came to the door, looking tired and drawn. ‘Thank you for coming.’
Lorraine stepped into the cool, darkened hallway as Jose walked towards her from the kitchen. He smiled sadly. ‘We just thought she was taking a shower. Juana even prepared her supper tray.’
They all walked into the kitchen and Lorraine and Jose pulled up tall metal stools to the glass counter. Lorraine said little while Jose told her how they had found Cindy.
‘So, she gave no indication that she was depressed?’
Juana shook her head. ‘No, she worked out in the gym for a while, then she came in here and said she wanted a light supper.’
‘Nothing happened that might have upset her? Any phone calls, any visitors?’
‘No, we would have heard, but the phone never rang and nobody came.’
‘Did you see the note?’
Jose nodded, and Juana broke down in tears when Lorraine asked what it had said. ‘Oh, just that she could not go on, that she did not want to live. I know this sounds very bad, but it was the first time I ever felt sorry for her, when I saw her . . . in the shower. She seemed so young, so small, so . . . defenceless. She looked as if she was praying.’
‘Could I see the room?’ Lorraine asked, and they agreed to take her upstairs. As they walked from the hall to the staircase, Lorraine registered the shattered ceramics, and the pictures that had been pulled down. One had even been slashed, while others hung at drunken angles on the walls.
The room was in shadow, the blinds pulled down, and everything had been left as Juana and Jose had found it: it didn’t even seem as if the police had been there. Lorraine noticed that another painting had been taken down from the wall and left on the floor, but remained silent.
She went into the bathroom where she noted the discarded towels and the necklace still lying on the floor, then turned back to the bedroom. Cindy’s shoes were still by the bed, and Lorraine crossed to the dressing table where cosmetic jars had been left open, and tissues stained with make-up remover were scattered about.
‘The note was left here?’ she asked.
‘Just there.’ Juana pointed.
Lorraine examined the dressing table more closely. ‘What was it written on? Just a scrap of paper, or was it like a letter?’
‘It was on her own notepaper.’
Lorraine looked round the room. ‘Where does she keep it?’
Juana opened one drawer then another, then scratched her head. ‘I think downstairs in the study. I don’t recall seeing anything in here.’
Lorraine asked if they had seen Cindy’s purse. Jose duly searched the room, and found it half under a chair, partly hidden by the ruched frill. He picked it up and handed it to Lorraine.
‘I’m surprised the police didn’t find this,’ she said softly, opening it. She tipped the contents out onto the bed. ‘Did the police take the paintings down? It looks like they made a lot of mess,’ she said casually.
‘No, no, they didn’t touch anything. Well, not that I could see,’ said Jose.
Lorraine glanced up and caught the look that passed between the two servants.
‘They didn’t do that,’ Jose said eventually.
‘Who did?’ Lorraine asked, and knew again that the Mexican couple were wondering whether to give or withhold some piece of information.
‘It was Kendall Nathan. Jose . . . We panicked, he called her.’
‘Kendall was here last night?’ Lorraine asked immediately.
‘Yes.’
‘She was at home when you called her? What time was that?’
‘I don’t know – late. I was going to take a bath before I went to bed. That’s how I noticed – the water was cold,’ Juana said.
‘It was after ten o’clock,’ Jose volunteered.
‘But when was the last time you saw Cindy alive?’ Lorraine asked.
‘About six, I think, when she came out of the gym. The shower was running when we took her tray up at eight thirty.’
But since she was found dead in the shower, that didn’t necessarily mean she had been alive at that time, Lorraine thought, then said aloud, ‘What did Kendall do when she got here?’
‘She was here for about an hour, and she was – she acted kind of crazy. We could hear her up here, breaking things, but we didn’t know what to do,’ Jose said.
What had all that been about? Lorraine wondered. Had Kendall been trying to mask her own guilt by staging a performance of grief and shock so memorable that the housekeepers would be sure to mention it to the police and, if necessary, testify to it? Had she already been at the Nathan house once that evening – or known that someone else had and that Cindy was dead before the Mexican couple told her?
‘Did you tell the police this?’
We told no one, only you. We didn’t know what to do,’ Jose said again.
‘What happened to the note?’ Lorraine asked, examining the contents of Cindy’s purse as she spoke. ‘
Did the police take it?’
‘They must have,’ said Juana. ‘It was gone when they left.’
Lorraine was concentrating on the contents of Cindy’s purse. There were a couple of sales receipts, a compact, lipstick, a few loose tissues and a wallet. The wallet contained two thousand dollars in notes and some loose change, a driving licence, parking tickets, more clothing store receipts, and a bunch of receipts from a jewellery store, but for payments made by the shop. There was also a small silver pocket book with a pen. Lorraine opened it and flicked through lists of things to buy and appointments for massage, beauty and hairdressing, all written in childish, looped script, which Lorraine studied closely. She looked at the date on her watch: the hair-dressing appointment had been for that morning. Odd that Cindy had arranged to see people over the next few days if she had been thinking of committing suicide but, Lorraine thought, it was always possible that she had taken her own life as a result of an unexpected mood swing – the girl had admitted she had had psychiatric problems.
‘The suicide note – I don’t suppose you noticed what it was written with? Ink, ballpoint?’ Kendall Nathan’s Mont Blanc pen was in Lorraine’s mind.
‘In ink, I think,’ Juana said, looking to her husband for confirmation, but Jose shrugged. Lorraine replaced the items in the purse, noting that the pen attached to the pocket book was a tiny silver ballpoint, and put it back where they had found it.
Juana said tentatively, ‘There is something else we would like to talk with you about.’
Lorraine nodded pleasantly and followed Juana downstairs, but she was wondering whether she could persuade Burton’s office to let her see the note. In the kitchen, Jose and Juana asked her if she knew what would happen to them. They wanted her to talk to Mr Feinstein on their behalf, to see if she could get him to release the monies owed to them.
‘I’ll do what I can,’ she said, and Juana clasped her hand gratefully. When they reached the front door, Lorraine paused. ‘Cindy Nathan had two thousand dollars in her purse, plus she wrote cheques to me on her own account. Didn’t you ever think of asking her for money?’
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